The Hot Springs star. (Hot Spings [Hot Springs], Dakota [Dakota Territory, i.e. S.D.]) 1886-189?, 1887-11-04
THE FIRST GLASS.
Startling Statistics Showing How Women

Startling Statistics Showing How Women
Were Led Into Drunkenness.
L. NJ. Hall, Superintendent of the
Woman's Reformatory Prison. Sher-
born, Mass, says:
..Out of the examination of 204 ine-
briate women I have found that 12s
egan their drinking by the use of
beer, 81 by drinking whiskey, as punch
at first usually, 20 began with wine. 8
with gin, and IL could not remember
what beverage was first used. These
young girls, mill and shop girls large
~. began by going to some so-called
r%efreshmeat saloon with their friends,
and the debutante usually began by
slipping a little tonic (made of hops,
sugar and water. charged with carbon-
ic acid gas and colored with burnt
sugar.. Beer 500 followed, and soon
riotipg, other kinds of %intoxicants,
rccklessness and crime; and what was
an innocent, foolish girl yesterday, is
to-day a branded criminal-all for a
glass of beer. Alas! how many ruined
lives 4 have seen. Beer was also the
beverage which older incbriate women
used to cntice the younger ones to
drink. A call upon one of these old
sots was the signal for the. pitcher of
beer to be sen for, and u little coaxin@
and urging would result in the first fa-
tai glass being inaulged in. The steps
were then easy.
1t may be OF interest to note that out
of the 2O4 inebria:e women, 126 had
been guilty of other crimes. and vet in
but sixteen instances did the first COM
mitment Of q crime antedate the habit
of drinking.
OF the beverages first used. while in
but 81 cases it began with whisky, in
1S7 it had become the favorite bevcr-
age. Several hopeless %drunkards, far
gone toward insanity, had never drank
any other lntoXicant than beer.
One hundred and thirty-two were
committed to prison for drunkenness.
56 for offcnseS against chastity and
public order, and 16 for crimes against
property. Their ages when last COM
mitted averaged SOY years. Sixty-tive
were between 80 and Al years of age.
40 between % and 81 years of age. 81
between 20 and 26 years of age, 80 be
tween 10 and 81 years of age. The re-
mainder were over Al years of age.
Many of the older cnes could not tell
how many sentences they have recciy-
ed, showing the absolute uselessness of
furnishing these poor creatures while
the temptations arc left in their way.
To show the effect upon children OF
inebriate p%arentage I collected the fol
lowing: VI Ill incbriatc mothers, 81
of whom had inebrilte husbands, 4OS
children were born. OF these 227 per-
ished in Infancy and early childhood,
and of the survivors many are doomed
evidently to an early death. In many
eases The death of these children was
indirectly due to the inebriety of the
parents, as cold, deprivation, etc.
Ages: T~wcnty-sevcn of the 2O4 women
began to drink intoMicants before the,
We're 10 years of age; II between the
ages of 8 and Is; "a bet wcen Ia and
81; 81 between 20 and 26; 33 between
% lnd 81; 10 between 30 and IL; 8
between 10 and 81.
Average age, 49, years. More thau
onc-half had formed habits of intern.
perance before they were tpyenty-onc
years of age. and moro than onc-l!,ira
at the giddv age of from 10 to 20 in
elusive; 1872 began to drink socially
and with female friends.